[2] Miguel Angel Rodriguez
(COL) bt Fernando Lopez (MEX) 11-9, 11-8, 11-8
Rafael
Reaps Fifth Successive PSA Title In Brazil
Brazil's
Rafael F Alarcon romped to victory in the MDO
Squash Open at the MDO Club in the Brazilian
capital Brasilia
to notch up his 20th successive PSA Tour
match win – and his fifth Tour title in a row!
The final
against second-seeded Colombian Miguel Angel Rodriguez
started well for Brazil's six-times national champion,
who won five points in a row from 6-6 in the first game to
open up a one-game lead.
After
taking the second, top seed Alarcon fell behind at the
beginning of the third, but as Rodriguez began to tire,
the local favourite re-established control of the game to
forge an 11-6, 11-5, 11-6 victory in 36 minutes.
"I am very
happy," said Alarcon, the 29-year-old from Sao Paulo who
also beat Rodriguez in last week's final of the
Ornitargin Open in Goiania.
"These two titles in a week will certainly help me to
enter the top 40 in the next PSA rankings in July. If
this happens, I will be the best Brazilian ever on the
world rankings, beating Kiko Frisoni, who was number 42 in
the world!
"I want to
thank my whole team - Sabir Butt (my coach), Sergio Oprea
(my manager), Eduardo Farias and Ronaldo Abud (my medical
team) and my training partners Luciano Barbosa and Edilson
Nunes," added the new MDO champion.
Opponent
Rodriguez was very disappointed: "Rafael played very
well, he volleys everything and made me run to all the
four corners! I became very tired from the middle of the
second game - and he knew this.
"But it
was a good week with two finals that will push me up in
the next rankings," concluded the 20-year-old from Bogota.
Alarcon is
now preparing to go to Europe, where he hopes to compete
in the Mamut English Open in Sheffield for the
first time in August as well the Heliopolis Open
and the World Open in Egypt
Rafael &
Rodriguez To Meet In MDO Final
Brazil's Rafael
F Alarcon is one match away from his 20th
successive PSA Tour match win – and his fifth title in a
row - after beating compatriot Ronivaldo Santos in the
semi-finals of the MDO Squash Open at the MDO Club
in the Brazilian capital Brasilia.
Top seed Alarcon,
the six-times national champion from Sao Paulo who has yet to drop
a game in the tournament, brushed third seed Santos aside 11-8,
11-2, 11-6 in just 21 minutes to earn his tenth appearance in a
PSA Tour final.
Rodriguez was more
sternly tested in the other semi-final. The 20-year-old No2 seed
from Colombia twice had his lead pulled back by Luciano Alves
Barbosa, but eventually beat the Brazilian qualifier 11-9,
7-11, 11-5, 8-11, 11-7 in 59 minutes to reach his sixth PSA final
over the past two years.
The final will be
the pair's second meeting in a Brazilian final in eight days after
contesting the climax of the Ornitargin Open in Goiania.
Barbosa Bounces Into
MDO Open Quarters
Brazilian Luciano Alves
Barbosa became the only qualifier to reach the last eight of the
MDO Squash Open when he upset fifth-seeded compatriot Edilson Nunes
11-5, 11-6, 11-6 in the first round of the new PSA Tour event at
the MDO Club in Brazil's capital Brasilia.
The 2004 Brazilian
National champion will now meet Mexico's fourth seed Armando Olguin,
who twice had to come from behind to overcome his unseeded younger brother
Marco Olguin 9-11, 11-10 (4-2), 10-11 (4-6), 11-6, 11-7 in their
first meeting on the PSA Tour.
Top seed Rafael F
Alarcon is on course to win his fifth successive tour title since
March. The 29-year-old from Sao Paulo beat fellow Brazilian Antonio
Jose Christovam Junior 11-9, 11-4, 11-8 and will now take on the only
Englishman in the field – seventh seed Neil Hitchens who needed
five games to overcome local player Vinicius Rodriguez 2-11, 11-6,
7-11, 11-5, 11-7.
